Romney advantage with seniors erodes

Given Paul Ryan, the president is suddenly not so scary. Once upon a time, the GOP had two demographics left in its pocket: Southern white men, and seniors. Unhappy with that turn of events, the party's nominee decided to winnow down its base even further by nominating Paul Ryan.

Success!

Even before his running mate was booed by a lobbying group for older Americans on Friday, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney was losing support among such voters, whose backing is crucial to his hopes of winning the November 6 election.

New polling by Reuters/Ipsos indicates that during the past two weeks - since just after the Democratic National Convention - support for Romney among Americans age 60 and older has crumbled, from a 20-point lead over Democratic President Barack Obama to less than 4 points.

On our own weekly polling by Public Policy Polling, Romney went from a 51-45 advantage among those over the age of 65 two weeks ago, to a one-point 48-47 deficit this week.

That seven-point shift is less dramatic than the 16-point shift that Ipsos has seen (PPP saw a much smaller original gap), but either way, we're seeing a significant change in one of the most important voting demographics. Not only are seniors the most likely age group to vote, but they were one of the few keeping Romney's numbers afloat.

It would certainly explain Romney's falling numbers.